CanLit: Coconut Dreams transcends culture, Red Ryan hides a secret

An epic work in short-story form, Derek Mascarenhas’ Coconut Dreams transcends space, time and culture in 10 interconnected tales revolving around two generations of the fictional Pinto family. The book opens with a fable-like story recounting the birth of Felix Pinto and a hair-raising adventure that pits him and his childhood friend Clara against a trio of adult villains in Goa, India.

[]

Flash forward 48 years, and we meet Felix and Clara’s children, son Aiden and daughter Ally, as they experience the universal joys and terrors of a suburban childhood a world away, in Burlington, Ont. Snow days and schoolyard bullies, newspaper routes and free-range escapades — it’s typical Canadian coming-of-age territory. Except when it’s not.

Along with field trips and first kisses, subtle racism creeps in, with one overt threat that ends in violence. Aiden and Ally grow up hearing bedtime stories and family legends about elephants and monkeys, coconut trees and king cobras, but when Aiden travels to Goa as a young man, it’s as a foreigner, a coconut — brown on the outside, white on the inside.

Drawing from his own experiences as a well-travelled South Asian-Canadian who was, in fact, raised in Burlington, Mascarenhas imbues his stories with human connection, whether through chance encounters, brief friendships or unbreakable family bonds, as the Pintos ultimately find their place in the world.

The Golden Boy of Crime: The Almost Certainly True Story of Norman Red Ryan

Jim Brown

HarperCollins Canada

Norman (Red) Ryan was a bad seed. Born into a large working-class family in Toronto, he was prone to violence and thievery at an early age. Described as a “malicious little bastard,” by a childhood friend, a string of violent robberies and a prison break in the 1920s and ’30s earned him a more romantic nickname, “the Jesse James of Canada.” But it was his talent for deception that ultimately brought him the greatest infamy. Sentenced to a life term in Kingston Penitentiary, he befriended a prison priest, renounced his wicked ways and became a poster boy for rehabilitation.

Championed by the press, along with politicians and even some members of the police force, he won early parole and led the life of Riley on the outside, all the while carrying on a secret sideline as a murderous bank robber.

While Ryan was a media darling in his time — at least until he was shot dead during a getaway in Sarnia, Ont., in 1935 — Calgary-based CBC Radio host Jim Brown looks at his life and crimes through a far more critical lens, exploring the culture of celebrity that let him, almost, get away with it.

A Brightness Long Ago

Guy Gavriel Kay

Penguin Random House

A beautiful assassin who’s a black sheep in her powerful family and the quick-witted son of tailor who rises above his humble rank are central characters in Guy Gavriel Kay’s much-anticipated fantasy, landing on bookshelves May 14. Another intricate tapestry, set in a land resembling Renaissance Italy, the story weaves their fates together with those of two devious rival warlords, a mysterious female healer and a pompous young fool blessed with a vast family fortune. Told from the perspective of the tailor’s son as an old man, and reminiscent of previous epics Tigana and the Lions of Al Rassan, it won’t disappoint Kay’s legion of fans.

Her Secret Son

Hannah Mary McKinnon

Mira (HarperCollins)

After his girlfriend, Grace, dies in a car accident, Josh Anderson takes her seven-old-son Logan under his wing. But he hits a snag when he applies for formal guardianship of the boy. There’s no record of his birth and Grace’s family has no idea Logan even exists. When he sets out to learn the identity of Logan’s father, he discovers there’s a much deeper secret to uncover – the identity of Logan’s mother. The truth is more bizarre than he could possibly imagine, but it should keep fans on the edge of their seats for the duration. Based in Oakville, Ont., McKinnon has authored two other novels, 2016 romance Time After Time and 2018 suspense The Neighbors. Her Secret Son has a May 28 release date.